I Became the Narrow-Eyed Henchman of the Evil Boss – Chapter 171

Chapter 171: The Siege of the White Light Tower (2)

Carisia’s life, excluding Orthes, could be summarized as a quest for revenge against the White Light Tower.

Even Hydra Corporation, in the end, was merely a means to enact that vengeance. But the fact that Carisia viewed Hydra Corporation as a tool didn’t mean she neglected its management.

After all, her target of revenge was White Light. You might only need an ordinary knife to tear through paper, but to destroy alloyed steel plates, you required a weapon with equivalent destructive power.

From the moment Hydra Corporation was founded, every task given to its members had been designed with the intent of forging them into weapons capable of standing against White Light.

The standard for “standing against” was low. Achieving victory in direct combat with White Light was almost impossible. Carisia didn’t expect much.

All she wanted was for Hydra Corporation to hold Etna City until her duel with the White Light Tower Master concluded. That was all Carisia demanded from Hydra Corporation.

For the most critical phase of the plan, only she and Orthes would be necessary.

To the directors, her orders were incomprehensible. “Defend Etna City”? There was no reason for White Light to dispatch an expeditionary force to Etna City. The success or failure of the succession war would ultimately be determined by who reached the Commandments. As such, the battlefield would naturally converge on White Light’s territory.

At that moment, the directors felt a faint tremor.

Guuuuuuuung—

A strange sound resonated through Etna City, like the rumbling of an engine starting or the hum of concentrated mana. The faint vibrations grew stronger.

『Do you hear me?』

“Yes.”

Orthes’ voice came through. Carisia snapped her fingers, and a hologram rose in the center of the meeting room.

Orthes’ image appeared over an unfamiliar landscape. The directors quickly realized he was not in Etna City.

Ignoring the confusion on their faces, Orthes continued speaking nonchalantly.

『The mana density around the White Light Tower is increasing. In about ten minutes, it will reach the level required to form an Eleusis space.』

“Kaicle has also begun her work. Have you sent the security codes for the communications line to Director Arabella?”

『I just transmitted the access codes for the Blasphemia line. Please tell those present to brace themselves. I’ll join you shortly.』

Beep. The hologram disappeared. Amid the directors’ evident confusion, some began to catch on to the hinted strategy.

Taros, who had long been tasked by Bertrand with scouring mana waste disposal sites for anything that could serve as fuel, growled lowly.

“Boss, you don’t mean… Etna City itself…?”

Carisia nodded.

“In exactly 9 minutes and 40 seconds, Etna City will move directly above the White Light Tower.”

Her golden eyes glinted sharply. For Neuro, the head of the Hunters’ Guild, it was a familiar look—the eyes of a predator sinking its fangs into prey it had hunted for years.

***

Kaicle was deep beneath Etna Volcano, making final adjustments to the Ether Space mechanism. Bertrand and Geryones were assisting her.

“Is this even possible?”

Geryones asked, half-excited, half-doubtful. He knew of Eleusis in theory, but…

“The difference in mass between a city and a person is astronomical. And the mana required for that?”

“There’s more than enough,” Bertrand rumbled in reply.

“The Commandments’ excess mana alone can alter the mana composition of entire continents. We’ve cut off Elysion’s supply, redirected their spatial creation technology, and concentrated the mana. Mana capable of moving an entire city’s mass? We’re not dealing with ordinary mana cores here—we’re dealing with the Commandments.”

Bertrand glanced at Kaicle. For this operation, the mana from their own artificial Commandments was also being fully deployed.

The mechanism worked by expanding the passageway—originally only large enough for a single person—using the combined power of both the real and artificial Commandments.

Geryones scratched his head with one of his six hands.

“Damn it, I’m more of a field guy. This theory stuff goes right over my head. So, what do you want me to do, old man?”

“Adjust the formula. The mana needs to be evenly distributed across Etna City. In theory, we’ve already optimized the city’s structure through constant redevelopment, but in case of any structural issues, you’ll need to fix them immediately. If a red light flashes on this panel, head out and deal with it.”

The exhaustive redevelopment of both Etna City’s surface and its underground infrastructure had all been leading up to this moment. The city itself served as an enormous magic circle designed to support the expansion of Eleusis.

The modifications to the mana conduits and the excavation of the underground space, conducted using Taros’ mutant subordinates, had all been part of this plan.

“So I’m just grunt labor, huh? What about Cretone, the guy who put so much muscle into tearing up the city?”

“He’s not skilled in magic. He’ll be leading the melee forces in Etna City’s ground defense instead.”

While Bertrand and Geryones busied themselves with adjustments, Kaicle slowly activated the artificial Commandments.

The countless relics they’d fed into it were now acting as a primer, extracting divine energy to power the artificial Commandments.

Residual traces of divinity still lingered in Etna City. Following the echoes of the Ascended’s footsteps that Orthes had revealed, the artificial Commandments pulsed with power.

Lampades’ radar activated. A list of points beyond the dimensional barrier that reacted to the artificial Commandments’ mana appeared.

Kaicle filtered out the false signals—entities from the extra-dimension reacting to the mere release of power—and identified pure, unintentional energy points.

Connection established. The artificial Commandments began to glow with multicolored light. From beyond the sea of stars, the power of gods who had long left this world began to surge forth.

Kaicle sent a message to Arabella.

Arabella, connected to her spider-shaped cybernetic frame, was silently grinding her metaphorical teeth.

Kaicle. Carisia. But above all, Orthes.

“Linking our Ether Space to theirs? Easier said than done!”

In essence, they were hacking the Ten Towers’ systems—a truly insane act. Even with the internal data Orthes had provided from Blasphemia, it was barely feasible.

Without the foundational technology extracted and developed from the brain chips² of Torres Tower’s former branch leaders—who had once pursued the goal of hacking the Commandments—this would’ve been impossible.

“So this was Orthes’ plan all along?”

The sheer scale of Orthes’ grand design sent chills down Arabella’s spine. She finally understood why they had exterminated every last member of Torres Tower’s faction and meticulously collected their brain chips.

With a sigh, Arabella extended her web.

The Ether Space beneath Etna Volcano rapidly expanded, growing large enough to encompass the entire city.

At the edge of the expanded Ether Space, Arabella’s web reached out, connecting to the secret Ether Network laid out by the Ten Towers via Panoptes—a network designed to provide access to any location in the world.

The security spells guarding the Ten Towers’ infrastructure opened effortlessly before Blasphemia’s authorization codes.

The Eleusis spaces above the White Light Tower and beneath Etna City were now linked through Panoptes’ network.

At that precise moment, a deafening sound reverberated across the world.

It was like the shattering of glass, the violent rupture of tectonic plates, or the thunderous roar following a storm of lightning—a sound both majestic and bone-chilling.

***

“Well, thank you for this.”

“Don’t mention it. I’ll probably be stuck doing this all day.”

The cheeky response came from Proditor, a priest of Pyrraeus, the Gatekeeper God. He had just used the holy incantation of spatial travel to transport Orthes close to White Light.

It was a precarious location, just outside the reach of the White Light Commandment’s influence.

“Is the plan still on track?”

“Yes. We have about one hour. If we don’t bring down White Light within that time, we lose. If we succeed…”

“Continue the succession wars. If you fail, retreat. Got it. Let me know if you need anything.”

“Haha. I’d love to, but using the holy incantation within the Ten Towers’ territory might be a bit… risky, don’t you think?”

Proditor grinned. Even now, this was pushing the limits of acceptable risk. If the holy incantation were detected within the Commandments’ influence, it would be instantly exposed.

Until Blasphemia’s sabotage fully disrupted the Ten Towers’ internal communication network, using the incantation had to be kept to a minimum.

“Good luck! When we’re less busy, I’ll read your fortune or something!”

With that, Proditor vanished beyond a golden gate. Orthes looked up at the sky.

At that moment, Etna City’s earth and White Light’s sky connected.

A profound roar shook the heavens and the earth.

Crack. The sky fractured.

Like a hazy image seen through a broken window, the silhouette of something immense loomed above the White Light Tower.

Orthes knew what it was.

Etna City had arrived.

The shadow of the city loomed directly over the White Light Tower. Anti-air magic erupted toward it, but none of it struck. What hovered above was merely a shadow, separated by a thin veil of space.

The massive attack spells fueled by the White Light Commandment struck the fractured sky instead, pushing the boundary of the space to its limit.

Finally, the sky shattered.

Fragments of the broken sky rained down like shards of glass, falling onto White Light’s barrier. The fragments acted as reverse-magic devices, disrupting the spells maintaining the barrier.

Beyond the shattered veil, Etna City slowly revealed itself. The polished, dome-shaped underside of the city was clear evidence that this assault had been planned for a long time.

The artificial Commandments’ overflowing mana, combined with semi-permanent generators harnessing volcanic heat, powered ultra-high-output propulsion engines³.

The city’s dome-like underside was densely packed with engine nozzles. The engines’ emitted mana and light cascaded down the sky’s fractures like liquid. This condensed, liquefied mana fell like rain.

Each droplet of the mana rain acted as a corrosive weapon, neutralizing the White Light Commandment’s influence. The barrier enveloping the White Light Tower began to dissolve.

Eventually, the engines’ light dimmed. All of their energy was redirected toward forming a shield around Etna City itself.

The significance was simple.

The city was falling.

It was the first reappearance of an extreme-mass weapon on this scale since the Mage King’s era.

Etna City descended alongside the broken pieces of the sky. White Light’s response was swift. Instead of retaliating, it poured all its mana into rebuilding its defenses.

Empowered by the Commandments, the White Light Tower managed to reconstruct its barrier in the nick of time, preventing the city’s direct impact.

But that wasn’t the end.

At that moment, the engines mounted on Etna City’s upper section ignited. Unlike the propulsion engines below, these were designed solely to accelerate the city’s fall.

Carisia adjusted the artificial Commandments’ mana supply in real time from the heart of Etna Volcano, pushing Etna City to fall faster.

And so came catastrophe. The White Light Tower’s barrier shattered brilliantly. Even so, White Light managed to deflect the city’s trajectory just enough to avoid a direct hit to the tower’s core.

It was a praiseworthy defense.

But Carisia had anticipated it. Of course White Light would block this attack.

And she was prepared.

The angle of the acceleration engines shifted. The city’s descent was no longer vertical—it slashed diagonally.

Etna City pierced into the White Light Tower like a blade. The tower did not collapse, sustained by the Commandments’ power.

Now, it was time for the two of them.

Carisia used the overflowing mana from the artificial Commandments and the destabilized space to teleport.

She appeared at the upper levels of the White Light Tower, where Etna City’s pointed tip had struck like a ramming spear.

Beyond the shattered walls of White Light, hostility surged forth like a flood.

Carisia smiled savagely. She had been waiting her whole life for this moment.

“White Light—!”

Her long-dreamed declaration echoed.

“The ghost you erased has returned! I will reclaim my name!”